Resurrection Sunday and the Ultimate Reality
(8 April 2012, Easter 2012)
Resurrection Sunday (Easter) is the celebration of the focal point of the ultimate reality.
In the beginning was the Word, the Word was God, and the Word was with God.
Jesus is the Word. The revelation of heaven intersecting earth, spirit and material in one being and eternity in history.
He came to display a glimpse of the ultimate reality in splendour and with spectacle.
So that we are shockingly reminded about that aching in our soul, that eternity in the hearts of men, that simmering feeling of incompleteness; reminded that there is more – more to not just life, or this world, or us. No. Not more to, but more than. He came to show us the real reality.
Where nature’s laws prohibited, they will be unravelled.
Where we did not understand why, they will be revealed.
Where there was injustice, they will be rectified.
Where there was oppression, there is liberty.
Where there was pain, there will be joy.
Where there was crying, there will be wiping of tears.
Where there was temptation, there will be happiness.
Where there was abandonment, there will be family.
Where there was sickness, there will be healing.
Where there was fatigue… from caring for disabled children, or debilitated parents, or feeding hungry orphans, there will be rest. And there will be gratitude.
Where there was struggling with pornography, masturbation, prostitution, sex, there will be sanctified joy.
Where there was ostracism, marginalization, nonrecognition, denial, there will be warm embraces.
Where there were beating and slapping and kicking and shooting and killing, there will be refuge.
Where there was hunger, there will be abundance.
Where there was death, there will be reunion.
Where there was shame, there is love.
The Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus are central to all of that. He carried all the former onto the Cross. He brought them to the nether.
Then He came back. The King returned not to show that it was a done deal. The risen King returned to proclaim that it has finally begun. The process of reconciling: the imperfect with the perfect, the hidden with the revealed, the temporal with the everlasting, the partial with the ultimate.
He did not usher the world into heaven. He brought heaven into the world. He did not demolish the material. He reconciled material with the spiritual. He did not shatter our egos. He is transforming them to perfection.
The transformation of everything is towards ultimate redemption. It began at the Resurrection. It is ongoing. It will last till His Return.
‘By His wounds we are healed’ is not a metaphor. It is the reality. Only that it is now and soon to be completed.
And His people are not merely the objects of transformation. His people are the agents of transformation.
The fire and wind in the upper room was not dazzling entertainment. It was democratic empowerment. We are not mere actors. We are citizens.
We are participants to an ultimate reality that is held together by one person. For Him, all things were made. In Him, all things are held. To Him, all things will be reconciled.
Resurrection Sunday is the celebration of this person, Jesus Christ.
As we celebrate, we are reminded that He is not merely the centre of attention; He is the centre of our vision, the eyes through which we must see, the heart through which we must empathize, the ears through we must listen, the mind through which we must reason, the hands by which we must heal, the feet by which we must walk. He must be the focal point of our epistemology.
Let us celebrate. But let us also see, hear, feel, touch, think, carry and go forth.
Let us go forth and join the march into the City of the King.